Annette Baier

Annette Baier
Born Annette Claire Stoop
Oct. 11, 1929
New Zealand
Died Nov. 2, 2012[1]
Dunedin, New Zealand
Era Contemporary philosophy
Region Western Philosophy
School Analytic philosophy
Main interests
Ethics, Feminist philosophy, Philosophy of mind
Notable ideas
Giving trust a significant role in ethics

Annette Claire Baier (née Stoop; 1929 - Nov. 2, 2012), a well-known moral philosopher and Hume scholar, focused in particular on Hume's moral psychology. She was well known also for her contributions to feminist philosophy and to the philosophy of mind, where she was strongly influenced by her former colleague, Wilfrid Sellars. Her husband was the philosopher Kurt Baier. For most of her career she taught in the philosophy department at the University of Pittsburgh, having moved there from Carnegie Mellon University. She retired to her native Dunedin, New Zealand, where she graduated from the University of Otago.

She was former President of the Eastern Division of the American Philosophical Association, an office reserved for the elite of her profession. Baier received an honorary Doctor of Literature from the University of Otago in 1999.

Ethics

Baier's approach to ethics is that women and men make their decisions about right and wrong based on different value systems: men take their moral decisions according to an idea of justice, while women are motivated by a sense of trust or caring. The history of philosophy having been overwhelmingly compiled by men, she suggests, leads to a body of thought which apparently ignores the role of nurture and trust in human philosophy.[2]

Bibliography

Books

Chapters in books

References

  1. "Annette Baier". Feminist Philosophers. 2 November 2012. Retrieved 4 November 2012.
  2. Annette Baier (1929 -) from Open2.net